have been once or twice reprehended for conveying a false and unreal view of the relations of the time; but the knowledge I myself had of Freney, of his habits and his exploits, was given to me by a well-known and highly connected Irish gentleman who represented a county in the Irish parliament, and who was a man of unblemished honour, and conspicuous alike in station and ability. And there is still--and once the trait existed more markedly in Ireland--a wonderful sympathy between all classes and conditions of people, so that the old stories and traditions that amuse the crouching listener round the hearth of the cottage find their way into luxurious drawing-rooms; and by their means a brotherhood of sentiment was maintained between the highest class in the land and the humblest peasant who laboured for his daily bread. I tried to display the effect of this strange teaching on the mind of a cultivated gentleman when I was describing The Knight of Gwynne. I endeavoured to show the “Irishry” of his nature was no other than the play of those qualities by which he appreciated his countrymen and was appreciated by them. So powerful is this sympathy and so strong the sense of national humour through all classes of the people, that each is able to entertain a topic from the same point of view as his neighbour, and the subtle _equivoque_ in the polished witticism which amuses the gentleman is never lost on the untutored ear of the peasant. Is there any other land of which one can say so much? If this great feature of attractiveness pertains to the country and adds to its adaptiveness as the subject of fiction, I cannot but feel that to un-Irish ears it is necessary to make an explanation which will serve to show that what would elsewhere imply a certain blending of station and condition is here but a proof of that widespread understanding by which, however divided by race, tradition, and religion, Irishmen are always able to appeal to certain sympathies and dispositions held in common, and to feel the tie of a common country. At the period in which I placed my story the rivalry between the two nations was, with all its violence, by no means ungenerous. No contemptuous estimate of Irishmen formed the theme of English journalism; and between the educated men of both countries there was scarcely a jealousy. The character which political strife subsequently assumed changed much of this spirit, and dyed nationalities with an amount of virulence which, with all its faults and all its shortcomings, we do not find in the times of “The Knight of Gwynne.” ‘ROLAND CASHEL.’